


By A Thread

by dendraica



Series: Stitches [1]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Bill being a demon, Body Horror, Gen, Mentions of gore and blood, Minor Character Death, Traumatizing children for the fun of it, Weirdmageddon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-23
Updated: 2015-11-24
Packaged: 2018-05-02 23:14:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 10,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5267552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dendraica/pseuds/dendraica
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Robbie makes a deal to save his parents. As usual, Bill Cipher is the one that comes out ahead. Way ahead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote a good portion of this while the power was out and a huge windstorm was tearing it up outside. Definitely felt like the world was ending, so I couldn’t ask for a better atmosphere to write this in. You can also read this and other works on my tumblr: http://maedarakatfic.tumblr.com 
> 
> Hope you enjoy this product of my twisted imagination!

Blackened snow. Twisted broken steel. The smell of fallen pine needles and split green wood.

That’s all the boy could remember about Christmas that year, no matter how many times he was asked by the counselor or his teacher. The concern stemmed from one of his hand drawn pictures, a class assignment prompted by the usual inane after-holiday questions.

The boy had drawn a winding road along a cliff side with a big gaping hole in the guard rail. Beyond that, a scape of snowy pine trees. In the midst of the trees was a swirling vortex of black crayon scribbles. Compared to cheerful depictions of reindeer and sleds and presents from the rest of the class, it was downright unnerving.

Phone calls to the child’s home repeatedly assured that all was well; no family members had any form of accident or trauma. Eventually the faculty allowed themselves to believe the child had merely seen something upsetting on television, or perhaps had a bad dream.

“Come on, sweetie,” Mrs. Harriet cajoled. She set a clean sheet of paper in front of the boy. “Why don’t you draw something more fun, like a present you got. Did you get any good toys? Any funny little new friends?”

Robbie hesitated. Yes, there was one.

He stared at the paper in mild concentration, searching the farthest reaches of his memory, before picking up a yellow crayon.


	2. Funny Little Friends

There are times you wonder whether you’re crazy or just really imaginative. And other times you aren’t quite sure of either.

Like when you’re in the bedroom, explaining the rules of a card game to a creature you’ve only ever seen in your dreams. Your mother quietly pops in with a plate of pizza rolls and you go quiet, worried she’ll think you’re odd for playing  
Phase Eight with thin air.

She plops the plate down between you and its hovering form, then cheerfully waves - at both of you - before departing.

It waves back and tries to feed you one of the snacks when it sees you’re not eating.

After you realize your parents can see Bill too, you start calling the funny little triangle man by his name whenever he visits. If the grown ups aren’t scared, why should you be?

Bill hangs around for a few years, popping in and out occasionally to snag one of your mom’s cookies. Asks if you’re happy with your parents from time to time, and that’s a weird question. Because of course you are.

Mom’s great. She’s always baking, always bubbly. At the age of nine, you’ve learned to buy veggie trays and orange juice to supplement your diet since she can’t make anything but cookies, pizza rolls, and spaghetti (your favorite foods since you were five). But that’s okay because she never gets mad at anything you do.

Dad can’t cook either, but that’s fine. Cooking and buying groceries is your job now, ever since the burning toaster incident. It makes you feel grown up and important. Dad just hangs around in his chair, smiling and cracking jokes that make you laugh because they’re so stupidly funny.

You tell Bill all this, and he seems pleased. He pinches your cheek and tries to force feed you a cookie.

Then he leaves one day, and doesn’t come back for a very long time.


	3. Hungry Smiles

Once again, Robbie tried to walk his parents through the problem.

“You both have to get jobs. There’s no money.”

“But we already have jobs, sweetie! Taking care of you!” Mom assured him.

Various utility bills that Robbie had rescued from the trash were spread out across the coffee table. All of them past due, several months in the red. The mortgage had been paid off by the inheritance from Robbie’s late grandmother, so they at least wouldn’t lose the house. (He thought so, anyway. Mom said a lawyer had handled it a long time ago.)

Right now there was nothing in the bank account but overdraft fees. No money for food or heating, and it was the beginning of November. Winter was going to suck.

Robbie was exhausted from explaining and trying to do the math. It had been a long day at school. He hadn’t eaten anything save for the bagel he’d filched out of the trash can that morning in the cafeteria. There was nothing in the fridge or pantry, save for a bottle of mustard and a sleeve of old saltines.

He did what any overwhelmed ten year old would do in that position.

“I’m hungry,” he whined plaintively.

His parents looked at each other, then turned to him smiling.

“Pleased to meet you, Hungry! We’re Mom and Dad!”

Their incessant laughter chased him upstairs. For the first time ever, Robbie purposefully slammed the door as hard as he could.


	4. Deals

Bill was back, but only in dreams this time. He casually watched as Robbie tried to keep people from walking on his grandfather’s face, embedded helplessly in the cement of a busy sidewalk. Robbie stood over the bloodied man, rudely demanding people watch their step and shoving back angrily at those who got too close.

“Heya, kid. Remember me?”

Robbie glanced his way, but said nothing. He refocused on the jostling crowd, unwilling to become distracted. His glare was enough to intimidate a few dream-walkers to go off the curb.

Bill drifted closer and looked down. “Know something neat? You’ve actually had this dream before. Though last time it was your grandma and you were trying to ask nicely. You got knocked down on your butt more times than I could count. And boy, did she get mashed up!” Bill laughed uproariously. “Nice to see you taking a stand this time around! Not that it did him much good.”

Robbie looked down and saw an unrecognizably crushed decaying skull between his feet, bloody brains pulping slowly out between fragments of bone. He yelled, stumbled backwards and tripped, landing hard on his back.

All he could see around him for a moment was blood, on the concrete and on shoes, as the faceless dream-walkers made short work of the head he’d been trying to shield. And now they would trample him, pressing him down into the concrete until he was just another helpless screaming face, his punishment for failing.

Bill snagged his arm and pulled him along until the world ripped sideways, until it was just the two of them, surrounded by comforting drapes of dark velvet.

“Now, I’ve been gone for a while, but I’ve looked in from time to time,” Bill started, conversationally, while his charge attempted to catch his breath. “It seems your quality of life is rather poor. Not that you mentioned YOUR quality of life in the original agreement, but still … ”

“Agreement? What are you talking about?”

“You know, the one we made after your parents took that fun little detour down the cliffside?” Bill blinked his one eye, drawing uncomfortably close to look into Robbie’s confused gaze. An instant later, he recoiled.

“Oh, no, no! Don’t tell me you repressed all that! Stupid young flesh bags and their malleable coping abilities! Of all the tedious overdone designs of creation!” He ranted, taking off his top hat and hurling it toward the ground in a fit of rage. It reappeared instantly back on his head. “I mean what good is a deal if you can’t even remember why you made it in the first place!?”

“Wait, what deal? I didn’t make any deal with you! I haven’t seen you in forever anyway. Are you even real?”

“Yep! As real as the cancer that killed your grandpa! And of course you made a deal with me, scarring childhood trauma and dismissive adults just helped you forget! You know what, why don’t I show you?” Bill lifted a drape with the edge of his cane to reveal a snowy forest at dusk. “After you!”

Robbie cautiously stepped out, snow and pine needles crunching underfoot. His first impulse was to hug himself against the cold but he soon discovered he wasn’t bothered by the frigid temperatures at all.

Bill was chatting away, something about how letting Robbie starve or get sick wasn’t conducive to what he had planned. Robbie was only half listening as he wondered uneasily why he knew this section of forest.

“So anyway, when you wake up, your parents are gonna both have well paying jobs. Certainly enough for you to have food and keep warm, and maybe a little extra. Also they’ll take care of things like the bills and legal stuff from now on, so you can focus on the depraved hell-prison you flesh bags call school.”

“Really?” Robbie asked, feeling a little spark of hope despite himself. This didn’t feel like a dream anymore and Bill had never made a promise he didn’t keep. No more trips to the food bank? No more transferring credit card balances to keep paying the bills? “You talked them into getting jobs? How’d you get them to listen to you? I tried everything.”

“Ha ha ha!” Bill stopped laughing at Robbie’s confused look. “Oh. You’re serious! Uh, yeah, I ‘talked’ to them, kid. People tend to listen to old Bill if they know what’s good for their spinal columns. Look, here we are! Just in time!”

Bill stopped them at a grove of trees near a cliff face and consulted a tiny pocket watch. From somewhere above, Robbie could hear the faint passing of vehicles on the road. Before too long the sound of tires spinning without traction over wet snow sent a cold spike of dread through his heart.

The grinding of metal as it bent out and then snapped was the second thing he heard clearly and this time bile rose in his throat as the suddenly too familiar noises continued. Screams, tree limbs crashing and breaking, an engine roaring pointlessly all the way down, and the final crunching thud. One of the terrified screams stopped abruptly. The other continued on in a choked wail of pain.

“Are we going to help them?” Robbie managed to croak, trying to swallow sudden nausea.

“Oh, relax! What do you think I’m here for?” Bill laughed, unperturbed in the least. “Now you sit there. I gotta go grab the kid that got miraculously ejected.” He disappeared with a faint pop.

“F-Fuck,” Robbie whimpered, realizing with sharp clarity that this wasn’t a dream; this had all happened once before, and now it was happening again.

Bill had left him there with the twisted upside-down wreckage of a blue minivan not even ten feet away. A woman’s arm was sticking out of the window. It slowly moved across the ground, fingers clawing helplessly through the powdery flakes. “Hey, try not to move!” he called, remembering the line from a tv show he’d watched. It seemed like something a paramedic might say.

He should do something. Maybe he could pull her free? He really didn’t want to look, but he made himself crawl forward through the snow. “Help is coming, just don’t move,” he said again, trying to comfort both her and himself with the sound of his voice.

Robbie touched her arm, took a breath and made himself look at her. Brown eyes stared glassily from a very familiar face, albeit one twisted in agony instead of beaming behind a plate of cookies.

The woman was hanging upside down from the passenger seat, belt still suspending her body. Blood was dripping freely down her body to patter against the snow. She turned her head haltingly to look at him as he gaped in horror, and then suddenly the top half of her flipped out of the seatbelt restraint and thudded against the ceiling of the car. Robbie saw entrails stretch and pile down after her, some hanging almost festively where they’d been caught by the crushed metal that had severed her in half.

He made the mistake of looking past her and seeing the mess that used to be his father. Robbie screamed and then choked on it as a hand dragged him away by the collar, depositing him back by the tree. “Geez kid, are you trying to traumatize yourself even further? Just stay put and listen!” Bill scolded him before vanishing again.

Robbie obeyed this time, shaking hard. At length he could hear crying coming from just around the tree trunk. Those deep ugly gasping wails that only young children could produce. Robbie risked a look and saw his younger self standing pathetically in the snow, clutching a blanket around his thin shoulders.

Bill patted the child’s head, staring solemnly at the wreck in front of them. “Tough break, kiddo. You got a spare set of parents stashed away somewhere?”

“Wha - nuh- no?” the little boy hiccoughed.

“No?!” Bill appeared to be staggered by that information. “Well what kind of dimension is this, where a sweet kid like you only gets ONE set of parents per lifetime? Doesn’t anyone plan for something like this to happen?” He sighed, scratching the point of his head under his top hat.

“What am I gonna do?” Robbie could hear himself wail.

“Hmmm … we could make a deal. I could give you one wish in exchange for an itty bitty favor in oh, about ten years from now?”

“A w-wish?” Robbie wiped at his eyes with the corners of the blanket. “You’ll bring back Mom and Dad for just a … a favor?”

“Sure! One little favor in ten WHOLE years! And yeah, I can grant absolutely any wish at all! Just shake my hand and we have a deal!”

A flicker of blue flame encased Bill’s hand and the child flinched from it. “That looks like it’ll hurt,” he whimpered.

“Oh don’t worry, it’s not nearly as hot as the fire about to melt your parents’ flesh off in a couple of minutes!”

Without a second thought, the kid grabbed Bill’s hand in agreement and winced as the flames raced up his arms for a mere handful of seconds before dissipating.

“Great! And now for the wish! Think very carefully about it. I tend to take things literally. Actually … maybe you better hurry up. As hard as it is to reconstitute severely damaged bodies, it’ll be even harder after that car explodes.”

It wasn’t an idle mention. From behind his tree, Robbie could smell gasoline pouring out of the tank and saw a stream headed for the sparking engine parts still trying to function.

The boy screwed his eyes shut tightly. “I wish my parents and I were at Grandma and Grandpa’s right now!”

“What, you and their mangled corpses?” Bill guided meaningfully. “I’ll let you try again, but only once!”

“Uh … I-I wish my parents were alive and, um, that they’ll be happy, and that they won’t get sick or die for a very long time, and we make it to Grandma and Grandpa’s house!”

Bill chuckled heartily. “Well, well, well, look who covered nearly all the bases on the second try! Wish granted. And now for the fireworks!”

Robbie, both young and old, turned in horror to the car wreck. “No, no, no,” he could hear his younger self begging, his own throat was too dry with terror to make a sound.

There was a great bang, and several whizzes and spiraling loops and it was a few moments before Robbie realized he was looking at an actual fireworks show. The car was gone, though there was still blood and bits of gore in the snow. He seemed to be the only one that noticed.

From not too far off he heard his mother’s voice.

“Robbie! Come on, dear, we’ve got a long trip ahead!”

“MOM, DAD!” The child whirled around, shot a jubilant look at Bill, then ran toward his parents at full speed.

“Careful, son, you’ll tell the bears and cougars where we are!” His father laughed. “We have to walk to Grandma and Grandpa’s now, but we should get through the woods before morning somehow, relatively unscathed!”

“And definitely not lost!”

Young Robbie hugged his parents, chattering excitedly as they walked together along the curve of the cliff. Eventually they’d come to where the road met the trees and get a ride the rest of the way. Maybe. Hopefully? Robbie was still hazy on the details of just how they’d ended up at his grandparents’ place.

But he could remember everything else. And simultaneously, he could remember an outside point of view watching himself making the deal too … His head was suddenly splitting and the earlier bout of nausea won over.

Bill was next to him, hand idly stroking his hair as Robbie threw up the canned ravioli he’d eaten for dinner. “Alright, kiddo. Let’s head back. We got some things to discuss.”

He lifted the edge of the forest up like it was fabric and once more they walked into the dark comfy space of dreamless sleep.

Robbie wondered if he should hate Bill for what he just witnessed. Obviously he’d just taken clear advantage of him as a desperate orphaned little kid. Then again, he likely would’ve died from exposure or any other number of ways alone in the forest if Bill hadn’t shown up. That … probably made things even? Nervously he swallowed.

“A-Are you some kind of demon or djinn?”

“Me? Oh shoot, let’s just call me an 'unknown entity’ for now and call it good, okay? All I want you to know is that I got something really big in the works. Don’t bother asking what - you’ll know it when you see it. Until then, just live life normally and I’ll pop by now and again to make sure you’re still alive. Any questions?”

“Uh … so the wish I made … is that why Mom and Dad are always so … .?”

“Cheerful? Creepily well adjusted to every minor and major pitfall of life? Sure! You wanted them to be alive AND ecstatic, remember? Unfortunately, you forgot to include yourself on the 'happiness chart’.

"But I can at least make sure you’re moderately content. Starting with a decent meal now and again. I didn’t realize you needed digital credits to exchange for food and stuff! WOW, what a stupid system! Small wonder you were waiting by the fast food dumpster for trash-fries, instead of just going inside like a normal bag of flesh! For a while there, I was thinking you preferred the taste of garbage.”

Robbie’s cheeks burned and he looked away. “I figured we were stuck poor since my parents wouldn’t look for work. I tried, but nobody will hire a twelve year old.”

“Awww, you are so precious, looking in all the wrong venues! Look, like I said, don’t worry yourself about a job, or money or food. You’re covered now. You just worry about you. Look, I got something your parents should have given you by now, but those scatter brains probably forgot.”

Bill pulled a package from thin air and handed it to Robbie.

It was addressed from his grandmother and he swallowed, hurriedly ripping away the brown paper. Bill idly set colored flames to the bits of paper as they fell, and watched as Robbie held up a black hoodie with a red stitched heart on the front.

Robbie swallowed hard, holding the warm fabric close to his chest.

“She … She said she was working on something like this this years ago. I thought she died before she could finish it.”

“I bet it means a lot to you, considering you haven’t gotten any presents from anyone for years and years and years,” Bill said as Robbie hitched, hugging the gift tighter. “But now? You’ll be able to just go buy yourself whatever you want! You don’t need anyone else to be thoughtful for you! In fact you can probably just … what … what happened, why are you crying?”

It was too much. Just one little thing needed to tip the scales after all he’d just seen and remembered, and the countless little heartbreaks over the years, and the knowledge of just why he could be so achingly lonely even in his family’s company.

He couldn’t remember the last time Mom or Dad had touched or tried to hug him. Not since he’d started holing up in his room after school, distancing himself from them; from their stupid smiles and jokes and refusals to take anything that upset him seriously.

But he was the one who had done that to them. Robbie realized that now. It was his fault, he was responsible for a thoughtlessly stupid wish and was even a shitty enough person to blame his parents for it instead of himself.

Bill stayed with him as he wept piteously, curling in on himself and trembling as he grieved for the parents he could barely remember. It felt like hours before his heartbroken wails trailed off into soft hiccups and the occasional sniffle. Bill was hovering over him, murmuring an arcane lullaby in eighteen languages at once and it was sort of making Robbie’s head spin.

“Bill?” he asked weakly.

“Huh? Oh, you feel better now, Stitches? Letting it all out is good, isn’t it?”

He didn’t feel better so much as too hollow and tired to cry anymore. And also gross. Bill snapped his fingers and Robbie felt a breeze slide over his face, clearing swollen sinuses and tears - from both his face and the treasured hoodie he’d been bawling into. It was as soft and clean as ever, and he muttered a genuine thank you.

“Come on, let’s get you to a realm you can actually wake up from.”

Bill lifted yet another curtain and showed Robbie his own bedroom. Imparting another broken thank you, Robbie wandered in, going straight for his mattress tucked up against the wall.

“Hey, Stitches? I bet that thing would be a lot softer and warmer if you actually wore it,” Bill teased gently from behind. Robbie turned and saw nothing but a poster covered wall.

Sighing, he lied down and after a moment, sat up to pull his shirt off. He slipped the slightly oversized hoodie on and laid down, staring at the ceiling until dawn.


	5. Bright Things

Bill didn’t make his presence known for a few months after that, but Robbie knew better than to think he’d just dreamed about the deal. Especially when he’d walked down the following morning to find his parents were getting ready for work. They had even made breakfast without setting fire to anything. (Robbie opted for cereal, just to be safe.)

They were funeral directors. That was the job. There had just been an emergency opening due to a car crash. “She was so young! What a tragedy,” his mother had said, before dissolving into giggles.

“Oh well,” Dad shrugged. “Hey! Maybe she’ll be our first customer?” He joked.

Mom laughed even harder, nearly dropping the butter dish in Robbie’s bowl as she started clearing the table. Robbie had eaten the rest of his breakfast in silence, chewing each bite of frosted flakes like he hated it.

Even though he knew it wasn’t their fault, everything his parents did was still abrasive to him. Their smiles, their jokes, their disregard for anything serious. He had yelled at them a couple times before he knew better, trying to make them upset. To see if he could make them upset. They’d only smiled and joked all the harder.

Now he just grit his teeth and did his level best to ignore them. Try as he might, it still got to be too much sometimes and he yearned for someone else he could talk to.

Like a miracle, one such person came into his life - a bright spot that made everything else almost bearable.

He’d crashed a birthday party at the arcade that summer, mostly by accident. Robbie had been there first, trying to beat the high score on a fighting game and down to his last few quarters. He could hear the tables being set up behind him and paid it no mind, but after a while his mouth began to water as he smelled pizza.

Out of cash and not wanting to go home (and also because old habits die hard) he resolved to nick a slice once the place was swarming with kids. It was a tactic that never failed; the adults always became too busy managing the chaos to watch the food.

The noise level had just started to reach the perfect crescendo when someone tapped on his shoulder. Robbie glanced over his shoulder to see a red-headed girl staring at him impatiently. “Are you done with that game? I’ve been watching, you keep dying on the same level. Maybe give up and let someone else play, huh?”

Robbie glanced at the table. There was still one adult sitting there, a muscled plaid-wearing guy who looked like he’d definitely object if some strange kid came over to snag pizza. “Just give me a few more minutes. This is my last game.” He was down to just one quarter, but the guy was bound to get his attention drawn away sooner or later.

“Well that’s good, cause you just got owned.”

“Huh?!” Robbie turned back to the game too late as his character was knocked out, prompting the coin-insert message.

“My turn!” She squeezed her body between himself and the console with the practiced moves of a girl who had many brothers.

“Hey!” Robbie scowled at the back of her pigtail plaited head. She ignored him, selecting her character.

True, he could buy time off his last quarter by playing an easy game elsewhere in the arcade, but it was the principle of the thing. “Whatever, have fun,” he muttered. Feeling ornery, he gave one of her pigtails a sharp yank before starting to turn away.

He was suddenly flat on his back staring at the ceiling, with the taste of blood in his mouth. His tongue carefully probed the bleeding tooth, feeling where it had chipped. The girl was leaning over him looking both mad and anxious.

“I didn’t mean to hit you that hard, but you REALLY shouldn’t pull people’s hair,” she frowned, then offered a hand. Robbie stared at her as the lights above outlined her like a halo, giving the girl an almost ethereal look. It was captivating and he abruptly forgot to be mad.

He took her hand and let her help him to his feet, momentarily too stunned to speak.

“You’re bleeding. Looks like I broke off part of your tooth. Does it hurt? I can get you some ice,” she offered.

“N-No … it’s fine,” he muttered, trying not to lean into her touch as she put a steadying hand on his chest, over the patched heart. With the other hand she was brushing the dirt off his hoodie. “I’m sorry. For, you know. The game wasn’t really that important anyway. Uh. Here.” He took her other hand and pressed a quarter into her palm.

She blinked. “I have like a ton of my own quarters you know.”

“Yeah. I know. It’s my last one and stuff, but I still want you to have it.”

Awkwardly, he shoved his hands into his pockets and tried not to look as stupid as he felt.

She stared at him and then smiled. “Wow, I sorta feel like a reverse tooth fairy. I broke a tooth, and you gave me money.”

It startled a laugh out of him and broke through a barrier. “I’m Robbie. What’s your name?”

“It’s Wendy. This is my brother Joshua’s party. You want some pizza?”

His stomach growled in response and Wendy laughed again, grabbing his hand and pulling him after her toward the table of food and its scowling guardian.

She turned out to be a pretty good friend. Robbie couldn’t have imagined he’d get along with anyone this well. At first she invited him to hang out at her house, constantly groaning in embarrassment at her brothers and overbearing father. Robbie sort of liked her family life. The chasing footsteps, slamming doors, and constant drone of survivalist programs was a pleasant contrast to two relentlessly chipper voices.

He had taken her home only once when she’d begged for a change, and afterwards they had both agreed never again. She was creeped out by his parents, which he had to keep assuring her he took no offense to. The next time Wendy’s family tested her sanity, Robbie showed her the Northwest Mausoleum.

It turned out to be the perfect hangout. He’d snitched the keys from his parents long ago and now simply wore them on his belt; so long as no Northwest died anytime soon they wouldn’t be missed. It was their little secret - Robbie never opened the doors to that lavish gold-plated paradise for anyone else.

Hot summers were spent lying on the cool marble floor, with trickling fountains inlaid in the wall echoing gently around them. Sometimes he’d sing for her, songs he’d made up on the spot, taking advantage of the cavernous acoustics. They weren’t amazing, but Wendy promised she liked them.

They talked, about everything and anything. Well, almost everything; Robbie never talked about Bill.

It wasn’t because he was afraid she wouldn’t believe him. Every time he so much as considered telling her, he suddenly had a strong feeling - accompanied by uncomfortable flashes of Bill looking very angry - that the entity didn’t want to be mentioned.

Wendy was good at finding distractions to keep them away from home. Most of them crossed the line of legality, but he didn’t mind. Wherever she went, Robbie would follow.

She was also good at making friends (unlike him )and before long her friends had become his. Robbie didn’t care much for any of them at first, but they eventually grew on him. Despite his occasional aloofness he grew on them too.

Tambry once mentioned he was like the stray asshole cat of the group. Annoying but oddly true, so he put up with it. Just like he put up with the occasional uncomfortable question.

“So what’s with you and explosions?” Lee asked him once, as Robbie put the finishing touches of graffiti on the water tower’s surface.

Robbie stopped, recalling a giant plume of oily black smoke above the treetops, and watching it from the road. The perspective of the memory made no sense and it wasn’t something he liked to dwell on. “Dunno,” he muttered, finishing up and snapping the can’s cap back on. “Just dream about them a lot I guess.”

Away from home most of the time, Robbie finally felt good enough to start changing things. He kept the hoodie but dyed his hair black. He got piercings, and new clothing, and even a guitar, charging it all to his Mom’s credit card. Wasn’t like she gave a shit anyway.

Everything was going pretty well until the Pines kids showed up that summer. And then everything got unbelievably fucked.


	6. Losing Her

“Hey, Stitches, take it easy already. It’s not the end of the world yet!”

“I can’t believe you made me fall asleep! I was supposed to pick Wendy up at seven, and now it’s like, four in the freaking morning! I’m already on thin ice with her, how am I supposed to explain this?”

Bill appeared to shrug. “You can’t really, not without fibbing. So I wouldn’t even bother.”

Robbie sat on the bed heavily, covering his face with his hands. “This is a disaster. I never should have told her how I felt. I wouldn’t have, if it wasn’t for that stupid Pines kid!”

“Can’t argue there. Honesty usually screws up everything,” Bill remarked casually, poking and examining the things on Robbie’s dresser. He picked up an eyeliner pencil and stared at the mirror, experimentally applying the makeup. “Ooooh … Neat!”

“What did you even show me? I can’t remember anything now,” Robbie grumbled.

Bill chuckled, discreetly making the eyeliner vanish to his dimension. “Oh, you aren’t supposed to yet. The events you just witnessed won’t happen for a bit, but when they happen you’ll know exactly what to do. And what to avoid. Like the thing with the arm. Yeah, don’t go anywhere that can see you.”

“Okay,” he shrugged dejectedly, only half listening. Bill rolled his eye at all the angst.

“Look, I don’t want you saying I’ve done nothing out of the goodness of my gold-plated heart, so here. Play this CD for your little ice queen the next time you see her.”

Bill tossed him something and Robbie caught it, looking intrigued at the weird cover. “What is it?”

“A song you wrote in your dreams once, just for her. You know, that one you forgot before you could write it all down? Trust me, it’s a good one. She’ll love it!”

Robbie turned it over in his hands. “You think it’ll be good enough that she forgives me?”

“Kid, I guarantee you, she’ll be too hypnotized to remember why she was mad in the first place!”

After a moment, Robbie flashed a relieved smiled up at Bill. “Thanks. That’s really cool of you. I don’t know what I’d do if she ever broke up with me.”

“Oh I do. It’s pretty pathetic. In any case, be seeing you soon, Stitches!”

Bill was suddenly not there, in a sense that uncomfortably suggested he’d never really been there in the first place. If it were not for the CD case actually existing in his hands, Robbie would seriously consider seeing a psychiatrist - for all the good it would do.

Bill had assured him long ago that the pills to make him go away didn’t exist.

——————

Robbie stared at his phone in agonized misery.

If he thought watching Wendy walk away was painful, it was nothing compared to the radio silence that came after. She wouldn’t accept his calls or texts. She was pissed, and honestly had every right to be.

Bill had lied about the song (it couldn’t be his with a message like that hidden in the lyrics) but how could Robbie have told the truth on where he’d really gotten it? How could he expect her to believe him now, when he’d been frantically lying this whole time just to keep her interest?

He had to try anyway. Maybe Wendy would understand and they could reconcile.

Resolutely ignoring the warning images he received, he managed to type up the entire truth - about Bill, his parents, everything he’d ever omitted.

Robbie knew Bill wouldn’t like it but he couldn’t lose Wendy, not this badly, not her friendship too. He hit the send button despite the angry flashes becoming pulses of disorienting pain in his head, and wearily laid down on his side.

Hours passed with no response. All that should have at least gotten some form of reaction. A texted 'wtf, are you high?’ at the very least.

Robbie checked his history to make sure he’d been coherent. The paragraphs he’d written were gone from his last text, replaced by a single emoticon - a one-eyed 'winking' frowny face.

Part of him wanted to try typing it all again, but he had a strong feeling this was the last friendly warning he was going to get.

Nervous and sick with despair, Robbie turned off his phone. He couldn’t seem to stop trembling.

What was he supposed to do now?

——————-

He must have been a masochist because for a while he couldn’t stop trying to fix things. Robbie only stopped when he realized his attempts were just ways to keep busy - to keep from giving in to the loneliness that patiently waited for him at home.

After all, if he’d lost Wendy’s friendship, it stood to reason he’d lost everyone’s. They’d known her longer and that little snotty Pines kid would have delighted in telling everyone how he’d tried to hypnotize Wendy.

Exhausted and out of ideas, Robbie gave in and despaired. He spent days locked in his room, eating whatever food was cheerily passed through the door and absently throwing darts at photos of Dipper Pines. He knew he wasn’t in a healthy state of mind and would only decline further if he didn’t dig himself out of this. Honestly, he almost didn’t care.

Of all the people in the world to help him, Robbie was not expecting Dipper’s sister. Mabel really had no reason to, considering how many times he’d fantasizes about wringing the life out of Dipper’s body. He was pretty sure he’d been a jerk to her as well as her obnoxious brother.

Nevertheless, she had still snatched him from misery’s edge and opened his eyes. He’d never realized that Tambry was right in front of him this whole time, or she’d even liked him to begin with.

Robbie couldn’t understand how it had happened, but he was so, so grateful it had. He should have known Tambry’s initial disgust upon seeing him was all bluster and denial; his own must have been the same.

They’d left the diner together, only realizing after making out that they hadn’t paid for the chili fries they’d just shared. After laughing about it, they ran back to get her phone and leave a couple bucks on the table, not really caring if it was the correct change (those fries had tasted weird). Best of all, Wendy and the others had run into them at the concert. One tense moment later, she returned his smile.

After years of heartache and emptiness, Robbie could finally believe that everything was going to be alright. And he owed it all to Mabel.

——————

“Robbie, come on!” Wendy was screaming.

They were the only ones left that were still flesh and blood. The others had been turned to stone and then carried away. Lee, Nate, Thompson … Tambry.

Robbie’s instructions were clear. Maybe if he followed them really well, Bill would take pity and free them. One could always hope.

He fumbled in his pocket for his phone and turned on the camera, tilting the phone so that it encompassed Bill’s massive form up in the sky. Bill’s eye on the screen suddenly riveted to look straight into Robbie’s as he clicked a button.

There was the clicking sound of a camera shutter, before the phone dropped like a stone, screen cracking on one edge from its impact with the street. In bewildered grief, Wendy stared at the vacant spot where Robbie had just been standing before turning to continue her escape.


	7. Party At the End

“I’m here. What do I have to do?” Robbie asked, staring at the destroyed town below. He kept his voice as neutral as he could manage.

“Easy job, Stitches. You’re going to guard something for a while. Long enough for me to finalize a couple things. Then you and your parents will get to live in your nice comfy home together with a huge backlog of clients. I imagine you’ll have to pitch in and help them a bit, all those stone statues aren’t gonna position themselves. Beats digging mass graves though, right?”

Robbie swallowed hard. Bill had left him a perfect opening. He should have realized by now that nothing Bill did was by accident.

“A-About those statues … ”

“Oh yeah, your friends are stone too. Isn’t one of them that girl Shooting Star set you up with? You two were happy together weren’t you? And I bet you felt all your pain and unhappiness dissolve away like an angsty little rain cloud.”

Bill floated in front of him, hands clasped mockingly. “I was actually sorta happy for you too, kiddo. But here’s the unfortunate news … what good is a broken heart to me if it’s no longer broken?”

A snap of black fingers and Robbie felt something wrench from him. It didn’t hurt, but it left a devastating wake behind its loss. For a few moments he didn’t even understand what had changed.

Not until he thought of Tambry’s face, frozen in a scream of horror, and realized she may as well have been a stranger.

“What … What did you do to me?” he muttered.

“I just freed you up, so you can fulfill that favor you promised. Without any distractions.”

Robbie was clutching the patch on his hoodie so hard his fingers hurt. He could remember how if felt when she curled against his chest, when she ran her fingers through his hair. He could remember the sound of her laughter.

He could remember how he had loved her, but now … nothing. And like an old friend, devastating loneliness crept back in to fill the void. It was too much.

“How could you?” He grit his teeth. “You … really think I’m going to serve you at ALL after this?! Screw that, I’d rather die!”

“Would you now?” Bill asked, sounding amused. Sudden icy wind was blowing around them, sending the remains of a metal guardrail creaking in the wind. In the trees below, there was a long winding plume of black smoke from a fire. Glass crinkled between the asphalt and the soles of Robbie’s shoes.

“Just say the word, Stitches, and the deal’s off,” Bill hissed, and Robbie felt his head turn to look against his will. He saw a small figure lying prone in the road amid the broken glass and tire marked snow, eyes fixed on the smoke.

“Say the word, and I never find you. I never heal the internal bleeding in your broken, fragile little body - completely free of charge, I might add! I never give you the chance to save your parents. Now are you going to keep your end of the deal, or is this where I leave you to watch your tiny body get picked apart by scavengers as you slowly fade out of existence?”

Robbie felt sick. He understood now, where this memory had come from. Why it had often recurred, unbidden and unwanted. He looked at the smoke, and then again at the body lying in the road. Dying in defiance felt noble and brave, until you were actually faced with having to watch it happen.

As for his parents … it wasn’t their fault what he’d wished, now was it? He couldn’t let them die just because he was emotionally crushed.

Robbie bit his lip and felt the fight drain out of him. “Please, I’m … I’m sorry. I’ll do everything you want me to.” Cold and defeated, he wrapped his arms around his ribs.

“Good, had me worried there for a moment!” Just like that, the road was gone. They were back in Bill’s palace. “Incidentally if you mess up your job in any way, I will disassemble your parents on a molecular level while they giggle in mindbending agony the entire time. Got that?”

Still catching his breath, Robbie nodded frantically.

“Great! Here’s what you’re going to do for me.”

Although he wanted desperately to scream, Robbie dug his nails into the flesh of his upper arms, forcing himself to be still and receive his orders.

—————–

He watched from the fringes of the bouncing crowd, batting away the balloons and streamers that occasionally tried to get in his face.

Though Robbie never participated in one of the countless parties Bill’s prisoner threw, he was still unfortunately expected to attend each one. At least he wasn’t expected to smile through the damn things.

The first couple of days had been an endless parade of glitter and confetti, nights full of dancing and karaoke. If there hadn’t been such a desperate rush to fill the gaps in between events with more fun, Robbie would have felt more annoyance than concern.

It didn’t take a genius to see how upset she was; how hard she was pretending that everything was great. Unfortunately there was nothing he could do about it. He gave Mabel a small wave as she headed his way, munching on cheese puffs.

“Oh hey, Robbie!” The girl chirped through a mouthful. “You and Tambers having a good time?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess,” he answered, glancing around. He had actually been trying to avoid the shade that wore Tambry’s face, for obvious reasons. Mabel didn’t seem aware of what Bill had undone. “She’s hanging with Wendy or something.”

“Okay. Well. Have fun!” Mabel seemed reluctant to leave his side. Robbie wondered if he looked too real compared to the other shades wearing the faces of her brother and their friends.

Something like doubt appeared in her face for just a second, then another one of her favorite songs started. With a whoop, she bounded off to go dance with her girlfriends.

Robbie leaned against the wall, watching as the floor teemed with shapes and forms that appeared remarkably like people if you didn’t know where to look for the cracks.


	8. Catharsis

There was a strange pulse against the borders of the prison, one of the things Bill had warned him might happen. Not to worry though. Not unless Dipper actually managed to get through all the traps. If it did happen it was his job to keep Mabel from going with him.

Robbie had instructions on how to do that, though it left a bad taste in his mouth.

Against all hope, Dipper and a few other people eventually made it through. Robbie heard them calling Mabel’s name for hours as he searched. He was lucky enough to find her first.

The girl was curled up behind a gravestone in the cemetery, tucked into her large magenta sweater. Robbie stood in front of her awkwardly, more willing to just grab the kid and lock her in a closet than what Bill wanted him to do.

He sat next to her, noticing she was still wearing the flower crown from a party earlier this morning. It only made her look that much sweeter (and made him feel worse.)

“Hey. You need a place to hide from those weirdos?” he offered lamely.

“No,” she sniffled. “I’m good. They’ll never find me anyway. Not if I don’t want them too.”

Robbie nodded. “Yeah, cool, just stick with me. You don’t need a lame brother like that anyway.”

“Right?” Mabel asked, reaching up to wipe her face. “Dumb jerk, saying he’s going to stay here and let me go home all by myself? He didn’t even like this place when we first came here. He kept whining that he wanted to go home.”

He made a judgmental sound, encouraging her to continue. His stomach was twisting in knots. So far the dialogue was going just like Bill had showed him.

“Now he likes it so much he’d rather stay here without me?! Maybe I want to stay here too, but no, that’s not even an option for him! He just made up his mind about where he was staying and who cares where I was going, so long as dumb Mabel’s not around to stifle him and embarrass him and get in his way!”

She hitched, drawing her knees up against her chest. “Does he even care about me?”

And there it was. The part where he’d been specifically coached to pick up her little heart and snap it in half. Robbie knew he was missing his cue but he couldn’t do it; he could not bring himself to lead the conversation the way he was supposed to.

There had to be another way to keep her from escaping, without making Mabel doubt she was worth loving.

Robbie scrambled for a moment, then went completely off script. Something very subtle began to hum warningly at the back of his mind.

“I dunno what’s in his head, but you know what I’d do if I had a jerkface brother who hurt me like that?” he tried, ignoring the buzzing as best as he could. It grew a little hotter, but nothing he couldn’t handle.

Forlornly, Mabel shook her head.

“I’d tackle him and punch him in the kidneys until he cried. And I still wouldn’t let up, not until he apologized, like a thousand times. Which knowing Dipper … I mean, how often does he admit he’s wrong? And if he’s not gonna fix it, forget him. You’re an awesome person Mabel, and if he can’t see that? It’s his loss, not yours.”

Robbie could barely hear himself over the angry droning in his skull. It hurt and it scared him, but the look on her face was promising. Like she was about to give her brother a one way ticket to Loserville.

Everything was going to be fine now, he thought desperately. There was no reason he needed to hurt her so badly. It would all go according to plan; she would send Dipper away just like Bill wanted her to.

Just … on her own terms, though. Not manipulated into thinking her twin was actually happier without her. Mabel was contemplative rather than sobbing. He chose to take that as a victory.

The painful buzzing in Robbie’s head abruptly stopped. He sighed in relief then stood up, listening for voices. “They’re getting closer. Just let him look for a bit longer, then you can tell your brother where he can … . Mabel?”

She was gone.

“Mabel?!” he called, frantically looking around.

Oh shit.

The searing pain in his skull returned tenfold, forcing him to his knees. The domed sky above seemed to crack and shake as his vision filled with an enraged looking Bill. Robbie yelped, fright jolting him back into a headstone. He sat up hurriedly, ribs aching, but there was nothing there.

“One job, Valentino! You had ONE JOB!” Bill’s voice echoed unevenly around him. Robbie panted in alarmed terror, trying to locate the demon.

“Wait! I don’t understand, what happened?!”

“You were supposed to keep her away from Pine Tree! I gave you the words, I practically hand-fed them to you, and you blew it! Instead your little pep talk drove her straight to him!” This time the ground shook, making graves roll and sink like a waterbed. “Granted you inspired her to beat him up a little first, which is hilarious, but ultimately … .”

“I - I didn’t mean to!” Robbie cowered. “I thought I found a better way to get what you wanted! Please, just tell me how I can fix it!”

“Oh, of course you can still fix it.” A knife embedded itself in the ground between his legs. “Better hurry up. Pine Tree’s starting to get through to her and we can’t have that, can we? A nice deep line across the throat should put a stop to things.”

“WHAT?!” Robbie scuttled away from the dagger. “Are you crazy? I’m not killing anyone!”

“Is that so? Well then STOP WASTING MY TIME!” Bill’s voice became terrifyingly distorted and powerful. Above and around him, Robbie saw the world begin to disintegrate, pieces blowing away into a reddened sky.

He scrambled to his feet and looked desperately for something to hold onto. Not too far away he heard other familiar screams. In a matter of minutes, something large flattened him from behind, dragging his body along the grass.

“Soos, you alright?”

“Yeah, dude, I think I landed on someone though.” The weight lifted and hands were lifting Robbie to his feet. Immediately afterwards he was engulfed in a hug and drowned in soft red waves of hair.

“Robbie! Holy crap, you’re alive!?” He stared at Wendy, not knowing where to even start explaining.

“None of us are going to be alive if we don’t get out of here!” Dipper yelled. He was holding Mabel’s hand, despite the fist-sized red mark on his cheek. Robbie saw at the look of understanding that flashed between the twins before they started running.

There was no time for thought as Wendy grabbed Robbie’s arm, yanking him along after Dipper, Mabel, and Soos.

The sky moved uncomfortably around them, too fast to feel like part of the atmosphere. A jarring crash sent them suddenly flying and tumbling over the barren earth, adding to their many cuts and scrapes.

Robbie hacked the dust out of his lungs as Wendy first checked on Dipper and Mabel before crawling over to him. He heard Soos beside him groan softly before the man suddenly sat bolt upright. “Uh oh, we gotta move!”

“The bunker,” Dipper coughed. “Great Uncle Ford said it was warded. If we can get to the woods -”

“We need something way faster than that!” Wendy muttered as the shadow dropped over them all.

“I’m almost certain you do,” Bill agreed, much larger than Robbie had ever seen him manifest before. He heard Mabel squeak and started to get to his feet. If Bill still wanted to hurt her …

A glowing eye swiveled to pin him in place.

“Oh you’re ALL sitting ducks out here, Valentino, but let’s not forget the real victims of your failure!” Two forms appeared on the scorched earth before them and Robbie’s heart was in his throat even before he recognized them. “Good old Mom and Dad!”

His heart plummeted like a wingless bird.

“Why does that creep have your parents?” Dipper asked. “Were you working for him?”

The look of fear and misery on Robbie’s face must have spoke volumes because Wendy was suddenly beside him. “Does it really matter right now?” she admonished Dipper, before facing off against Bill. “Hey, you creep, they aren’t part of this!”

Robbie couldn’t make a noise, shaking as the others rallied around him. Bill snorted in amusement and made a lazy flicking motion with his fingers. His supposed defenders were flung away from him to land in the dirt.

“I’m really disappointed, Stitches. You spend years and years trying to craft the perfect guard-dog, only for it to roll over and beg when it should have been biting. Where did I go wrong? Perhaps I gave you too many treats? Didn’t kick you hard enough as a puppy?”

An unseen force hit Robbie in his bruised ribs, making him gasp and fall to all fours. Mabel called his name, sounding frantic.

“I raised you to be faithful and obedient to ME, not these pathetic flesh bags! What have they ever done for you anyway, except laugh at your misery and pain? And yet you really chose them over your family?”

Bill raised his arms. A ring of flames erupted along the ground, surrounding Robbie’s parents.

“Look, honey, I think we’re about to be cremated alive,” his father joked, and Mrs. Valentino giggled.

“Make sure you pick out respectable urns for us, young man,” she added, winking at Robbie.

This was surreal, them laughing in glee while about to be slaughtered. Robbie felt dull resignation where he thought he’d feel horror and guilt. He looked up at Bill, swallowing hard.

“M-My parents already died a long time ago. What you brought back … it was never really them, was it?”

The demon stared back a moment before lowering his arms, extinguishing the flames from his fingertips.

“You know, you really wound me, kid. But what the hey, go ahead and have a proper goodbye. I’m a sucker for sentimentality.”

Bill snapped his fingers and like waking from a dream, Robbie’s parents staggered forward and embraced their son tightly. He made a choked noise and pulled back, not understanding.

“I’m so sorry,” his mother was sobbing. “We-we couldn’t … We weren’t able …”

“Robbie,” his father’s voice said his name, with more emotion and inflection than he’d heard in years. The man’s words failed him, but for Robbie it was enough to make something in his chest start hurting again.

“It was us in there,” his father continued shakily after a moment. “It was always us. Like your mother said, there was no way to show you how much we cared.”

“There’s no time. You have to get away,” Mom whispered urgently. “He only allowed this so it would hurt worse. Honey, you have to just let us go and get away from him.”

Robbie’s heart dropped as he wrapped his arms urgently around them, panicking and thinking for half a second they could all flee together.

With a sickening wrench, his mothers head snapped around to face backwards.

Robbie screamed and instinctively recoiled, watching helplessly as his father doubled over in pain. The older man’s jaw snapped impossibly open to vomit himself inside out, starting with his own face. Mindlessly, the two bodies flailed around in the dirt, trying to fix what couldn’t be undone against the soundtrack of Bill’s irrepressible laughter.

He tried to go to them but someone’s arm grabbed him around the waist. In spite of Robbie’s struggles, he was hoisted over a hefty shoulder and they were suddenly moving away, quickly. He squirmed and kicked, brain stubbornly insisting he could still help his family - somehow - if Soos would just let him try.

A whoosh overhead indicated that something else had joined the chase, and Robbie caught a glimpse of a giant hand snatching at the air where they’d just been. It was attached to a face, screaming unintelligible demands as it dragged itself after them.

He had no idea how they actually got away, because in the next second Wendy was dabbing his face with water in the shade of a tree. “Easy, shhh,” she consoled him, and firmly pushed Robbie back down as he scrabbled to get up. “You blacked out for a bit. Just rest for a minute, then we’ll see if you can walk.”

“They were still alive,” he heard himself babble. “They were still - they were moving, they were still -”

“Robbie.” Her voice was uneven with tears as she caressed his face. “I’m so, so freaking sorry. They … weren’t anymore.”

He closed his eyes in devastation, not wanting to hear as Wendy continued, even as gentle as she was. “When I looked back … Nothing anyone could have done would have helped them.”

Robbie shook his head, gritting his teeth against the truth. A sudden distant crash-and-drag made them all start, and Dipper scrambled to his feet. “We should keep moving,” the boy said hurriedly, voice tight with fear. He helped a clearly exhausted Mabel get up.

Breathing shallowly, Robbie let Wendy help him stand. The unnerving noise got closer, accompanied by falling trees. The thing with the arm … Bill had warned him. Between grief and terror, the latter won out and adrenaline took over.

He and Wendy shared a tired look, then walked over to the twins. “Grab on, Dipper,” he heard Wendy order. He knelt mutely with his back to Mabel and she gave no protest to clambering on his back, unlike her brother.

“But–”

“Drop the fragile masculinity, you weigh less than a backpack full of firewood!” Wendy barked. Dipper sheepishly obeyed as the crashes and bellowing became even more distinct.

“Is it just me or does it sound even hungrier?” Soos muttered as they hastened out of there.

The sprint through the forest was tense and frightening as they all tried to keep within sight of each other. For a couple horrifying minutes, Robbie and Mabel found themselves separated from the group by several lines of trees. He didn’t dare stop moving, not even as the path forced them into a clearing.

“Go the other way!” Mabel directed frantically as Robbie had to slam on the brakes to avoid colliding with a giant cloven foot, one of a set of four. The hoof shifted, grinding the shrubs beneath it to powder before rising to take another step. Robbie darted to the left and back into the tree line. He saw Wendy’s red hair up ahead and put on more speed to close the distance.

Not far enough behind them was again the sound of an arm dragging its perpetually hungry head behind it. It suddenly stopped with a pained yell, accompanied by the bleat of an enraged goat and stomping hooves. Whatever was happening, Robbie was thankful to put it further behind them.

They didn’t really slow their pace until they reached an area Dipper promised was safe. He got off Wendy’s back and started walking around the base of a tree, looking for something. Panting, Robbie dropped to one knee, letting Mabel step down. She reached up silently to take his hand, and without a moment’s thought he accepted it.

The bunker turned out to already have a resident, albeit a welcome one, judging by the glad cries and hugs the old recluse got from their group. He was delighted to have company, bustling about to find bedding and putting on hot water for drinks.

Robbie just stood near the interior wall looking shell shocked, until Wendy made him sit down on one of the chairs.

There was warmth, talking voices, and a single slice of warm eternal pizza passing from hand to hand. Every time Robbie let his eyes drift shut, he saw his mother’s neck snap. The next time he jolted awake, he had a blanket around his shoulders and Wendy was cleaning a cut on his cheek. She handed him a mug of hot chocolate.

“Mabel made you that. It should be cool enough to drink.”

Robbie glanced around the room. He had no idea what time it was but McGucket and Soos were both in some kind of snoring competition, and Dipper was curled up next to Mabel on one of the beds. They had fallen asleep holding hands.

“How long …?”

“You’ve been drifting in and out for a couple of hours.”

He blinked and brought the mug to his lips, drinking slowly. It was rich and warm, soothing his throat. Robbie felt like a horrible person for enjoying the small comfort. Shouldn’t he be crying or something? Maybe by now he was too fucked up to have normal emotions.

An awkward silence grew between them. Robbie was half afraid she was going to say how sorry she was about his parents being killed in front of him. No. He couldn’t handle that, not when he could only seem to feel relief that their ordeal was finally over.

“They died in a crash when I was six,” Robbie told her. Wendy looked up, as though surprised he was willing to talk about it. “Bill showed up and offered me a deal. I didn’t know any better.”

“Of course not,” she said, and he relaxed somewhat at the understanding timbre of her voice.

Robbie haltingly continued. After ten years of having to hold back the truth, sometimes even wondering if all this wasn’t a complex delusion, finally telling someone was almost more relief than he could endure.

“I just wasn’t going to kill anyone,” he finished, clenching the mug like a lifeline. “I guess that was the deal breaker.”

Wendy nodded, looking steely. “Okay,” she said, after a moment. “So first off, next time I see that stupid triangle, I’m gonna scatter his bricks like a fucking Jenga tower.”

Robbie smirked, seeing the same girl who’d once hogtied a larger bully over a stolen ice cream sandwich. (It hadn’t even been hers.) He was glad to have a friend like her in his corner.

“Then once we get Tambry and the others back, we’ll find a way to undo whatever he did and get you two lovebirds back together.”

He felt his smile slip away. “Yeah, I’d be happy with just getting them all back to normal.” Robbie couldn’t quite understand why, but he felt like Bill had removed something that wasn’t possible to put back. Wendy thankfully didn’t press the issue.

Eventually Robbie dropped into an exhausted sleep, unable to hold off the certainty of nightmares a minute longer. He still had one solace left to him before all lucid thoughts drifted away:

In the warded safety of the bunker, there could at least be no more dreams of Bill.


End file.
